On our way home from a wedding on Jekyll Island, Georgia I received a text message from Melissa, our former neighbor. She used to babysit for our daughter when she was a youngster and now lives in New York with her husband, a videographer and filmmaker.
Melissa is one of those people who doesn’t send random text messages or emails. She usually has a question or an observation about synchronicity and a post often evolves from her communication.
Her text: Hey, watching an episode of Elementary, and a woman character who changed identities made a new life and changed her name to Alison Drake. That’s one of your pseudonyms, right?
I’d never heard of this show. So I Googled it, of course, and learned that it’s about Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Joan Watson “In a modern-day drama about a crime-solving duo that cracks the NYPD’s most impossible cases.” Click the link below and read the full synopsis.
And yes, Alison Drake was one of my pseudonyms. She wrote four books – Tango Key, Black Moon, High Strangeness, and Lagoon. I eventually stole Tango Key – the island – from Alison, and used it for my series about psychic and bookstore owner Mira Morales, who lives on the island.
The synchro here is interesting. When I wrote Tango Key, my editor at the time, Chris Cox, suggested I use a female pseudonym (instead of the androgynous TJ MacGregor) because mysteries by women were then outselling mysteries by men. So, in a sense, I was changing my identity, just as the female character did in the Elementary episode, Ears to You, that Melissa was watching.
I texted Melissa: Is this a synchro or theft?
Melissa: Both! Trickster…maybe.
I have no idea what the odds are here, but it struck me as very weird.
High Strangeness,indeed.
Now here’s a synchro: one of Alison Drake’s books was High Strangeness!
Fun synchro — I was just reading ‘Aliens in the Backyard’ last night before bed and it was the highs strangeness chapter! I just had to check my bookmark to make sure!!!
High strangeness…sorry for the typo.
I knew that she was in a book called High Strangeness from the post .That’s why I wrote it.
Not a synchro I’m afraid.
I have some friends who watch that show and enjoy it very much. If I weren’t already involved in too many shows, this is one I would probably really enjoy. But I am thinking that this synchro is probably just that and not theft. But what do I know? 🙂
I was kidding about the theft…it’s just an odd synchro!
I guess you may never have known this without the email.
“…mysteries by women were then outselling mysteries by men” – interesting, I didn’t realise such things made a difference at specific times.
No one ever said that publishing makes sense!
I completely forgot about this text exchange until I read this post this morning! I loved this one!